3 Habits of Highly Effective Sales Teams

Time is a precious resource in sales and effective sales teams incorporate habits into their routine that optimize their time and increase their chance of prospect engagement.

Did you know that 37% of a sales rep’s time is actually spent selling? Much time is spent logging sales activities into a CRM, looking for the next best call, handling lead data, checking for duplicates, responding to non-related inquiries, and the list goes on. Although these activities are necessary, it is important to prioritize and make sure activities are aligned with generating revenue.

Sales leaders who build effective sales teams are integrating optimization strategies into the daily routine of each salesperson to drive prospect engagement – because even top performers can be rendered ineffective if they can’t get prospects to interact. Inspired by the 7 Habits of Highly Successful Inside Sales Teams webinar, we’ve highlighted three effective strategies you can implement today to increase prospect engagement.

Effective sales teams respond in under a minute

Close rates increase by 391% if a lead is called in less than one minute.

When it comes to inbound leads, timing is everything. These leads are knocking at your door begging for answers, so they can make an educated purchase decision – why wouldn’t you call them immediately? Inbound leads are likely on the Internet looking for a solution to their problem when they submit an inquiry – they are ready to engage – so the first to respond gets the advantage. In fact, close rates increase by 391% if a lead is called in less than one minute!

Effective sales teams become a trusted resource

When you provide answers to those with questions, you open up the opportunity for dialogue and position yourself as a trusted resource. One way to do this is to provide insight, feedback, and answers on social forums like LinkedIn. These forums are filled with people looking for solutions and if you can contribute by providing genuine insight, you will build your network – and increase opportunity to develop new leads.

Additionally, staying connected to social forums allows you to stay connected to what people are saying. It is a good, organic way to understand the pulse of your prospects.

Effective sales teams leave a voicemail message

Leaving a voicemail message is a great way to personalize your outreach.

Don’t hide behind email – reach out to prospects by calling them! Calling prospects is a good way to personalize your connection. It complements the emails you send and is a good way to peak prospect interest. If you do call, but aren’t leaving a voicemail, you’re not leveraging all the tools in your tool belt – only 50% of inquiries receive voicemails.

When you send an email to a prospect and follow up with a call, it’s likely they won’t recognize your number and won’t pick up. Leaving a voicemail is a good way to reference an email you sent to close the communication loop and create a stronger, multi-channel contact strategy.

About the author: Joshua Pittman is the Vice President of Inside Sales at Velocify. A seasoned Inside Sales expert with over 10 years of experience, Joshua specializes in architecting, growing and leading sales organizations within the technology space. He has built numerous high performing teams throughout the country; most recently designing and executing the sales growth plan of California-based startup, Cargomatic. Joshua also architected and implemented the sales structure and growth plan at Minneapolis based Sport Ngin, a leader in the emerging sports technology space. During his 4-year tenure at the high growth Washington DC social commerce startup Livingsocial, he built out an industry leading 100+ rep Inside Sales team while driving numerous successful pilot initiatives. Joshua studied at Anoka Ramsey in Minneapolis with a focus on business management and administration.